This blog is adapted from remarks delivered by Executive Director Elizabeth G. Taylor at receptions for our Board of Ambassadors in New York, NY, and Washington, DC. To learn more about the Board of Ambassadors and other opportunities to support the work of the National Health Law Program, please contact Mizue Suito at [email protected].
We are in the business of saving lives and making it possible for people to thrive.
Our country is in a struggle over what we mean by the liberty that we all believe our government must protect. Is it the liberty of the few at the top to be left alone to rise higher to the top, or is it the freedom of everyone to enjoy the blessings of liberty? That’s the freedom Franklin Roosevelt identified as essential to our democracy—the freedom from want—the freedom to move out of the inequality that has been baked into our country since its beginnings. The freedom to bring a healthy baby into the world or to choose not to have a child. The freedom to be healthy. The freedom to thrive.
NHeLP is working on multiple fronts to protect access to health care essential to the freedom to thrive. We enforce the robust Medicaid guarantees for children because no child in this rich country should go without the health care they need to pursue their dreams.
We are working to protect access to the full range of reproductive health care. We are litigating in Florida against a state law banning access to gender-affirming care for transgender individuals, care that medical professionals deem essential health care.
We are working at the policy level and in litigation to address the mental health crisis the country is finally waking up to—this work is literally essential to keep people free from institutionalization.
We are working in every state to protect against what everyone predicts—that millions will lose health care as the COVID emergency ends.
And in Washington, it feels like déjà vu all over again (to quote Yogi Berra). We fought against work requirements and block grants during the Trump administration—policies that sound harmless but are designed to reduce the Medicaid rolls. We won in those fights from 2017 until the Biden administration changed the policy. We protected access to health care for hundreds of thousands of people. This time, the challenge is different because it is Congress posing the threat. So we are educating policymakers and the people who elect them about what’s really at stake.
One of the most valuable things you can do to help is to share our messaging. Sign up for updates if you haven’t done that and share them with your networks.
Follow us on social media and share our posts. We need to reach as many people as possible, and you are essential to this effort, essential to protecting the freedom to thrive.
And, of course, your financial support enables us to support our amazing team, working at the federal level and in every state in the country, to be where we need to be to protect and improve access to health care for the people who need us most.
See more photos of the NHeLP Board of Ambassadors receptions:
- New York reception photo album (photos by Front Page Photography)
- DC reception photo album
Our special gratitude to ArentFox Schiff LLP and Debevoise & Plimpton LLP for hosting the receptions.
To learn more about the NHeLP Board of Ambassadors and other opportunities to support the work of the National Health Law Program, please contact Mizue Suito at [email protected].
